Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution

The Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution, the UK's most influential environmental think tank, announced today the five main themes of its study of planning systems. The scope of the Study goes much wider than land use planning (although that aspect is central) and encompasses other planning regimes, such as those covering pollution control, air quality, waste, water, agri-environment and biodiversity. The Commission will consider whether radical reform of the planning systems in place throughout the UK would help deliver a more effective, accountable and transparent way of protecting the environment within the context of sustainable development. Its report will be published next year.

The five main themes (environmental sustainability, boundaries, integration or coordination, subsidiarity and democracy, and assessment approaches) each have a number of specific questions associated with them (list below). The Commission has written to over a thousand organisations and individual experts inviting them to submit evidence on these questions by 23 June. Others are welcome to submit their views. The invitation to submit evidence, together with the information gathered in the scoping phase of the study, can be found on the Commission's website at:

http://www.rcep.org.uk/planning.html

The Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution is an independent standing body. Its terms of reference are to advise on matters, both national and international, concerning the pollution of the environment; the adequacy of research in this field; and the future possibilities of danger to the environment. The Members of the Commission are appointed by Her Majesty the Queen on the advice of the Prime Minister. The Chairman is Sir Tom Blundell FRS.

The Commission's Study on Environmental Planning aims to assess whether the various regimes at different levels for setting and achieving environmental goals provide an effective, accountable and transparent way of protecting the environment. Its scope goes much wider than land use planning (although that aspect is central) and encompasses other planning regimes, such as those covering pollution control, air quality, waste, water, agri-environment and biodiversity. Today's announcement marks the end of the scoping phase of the Study, which has encompassed background reports produced by consultants, responses to the original announcement of the Study (22 July 1999) and a seminar held by the Commission on the subject. These inputs are all available on the Commission's website.

The contacts for enquiries about this announcement are:

    John Rea
    (tel. 020 7273 6642, email john.rea@rcep.org.uk

    Howard Morrison
    (tel. 020 7273 6638, email howard.morrison@rcep.org.uk

They can also provide further information and guidance about the submission of evidence.

Key Themes

The aim of this study is to assess whether the various regimes at different levels for setting and achieving environmental goals provide an effective, accountable and transparent way of protecting the environment. To this end, there are five key themes below on which the Commission is seeking evidence. Each theme has a number of questions associated with it.

The scope of the study goes much wider than land use planning (although that aspect is central) and will encompass other environmental planning regimes, such as pollution control, air quality, waste, water, agri-environment and biodiversity. Most of the questions below are intended to address environmental planning in general, but some are specific to regimes such as land use planning or pollution control.

The Commission does not expect those responding to address all of the questions - many respondents may wish to comment on only a few of the issues raised below. The list of questions is not intended to be exhaustive and respondents are welcome to address other issues relevant to the key themes that they wish to draw to the Commission's attention.

1. Environmental sustainability

The Commission recognises that sustainable development has economic, social and environmental components. Within that framework the Commission sees its particular function as to ensure that environmental sustainability is not being prejudiced. In this case the Commission wishes to investigate the extent to which current environmental planning systems promote or prejudice environmental sustainability.

a.  Has the pursuit of sustainable development as the broad objective of policy had favourable or unfavourable consequences for protection of the environment? To the extent that consequences have been unfavourable, how could that best be remedied?

b.  Can environmental objectives always be balanced against other issues or are there environmental imperatives? If so, how are they (or how should they be) determined?

c.  What regulatory approaches are likely to be the most effective and practicable to protect the environment, in both measurable terms, e.g. water, soil and air quality, and less tangible aspects, e.g. landscape and amenity?

d.  In practice, to what extent does land use planning still embody a presumption in favour of development? Has the legislative change to a plan-led system given land use planning the potential to become a more effective instrument for achieving environmental sustainability? Is any further change necessary, and, if so, what?

e.  In practice, how far have planning regimes in general moved from "predict and provide" to "plan, monitor and manage" to avoid environmentally unsustainable outcomes?

f.  Do current arrangements for environmental planning sufficiently take into account the cumulative impacts of developments?

g.  To what extent is effective environmental planning hindered by a lack of resources within central government and local government, statutory agencies and advisory bodies? Have the procedures become too complex for any institution to cope adequately?

h.  What are the implications of long-term risks, such as those posed by climate change or persistent waste, for environmental planning? Can planning systems become drivers for limiting the extent of damage from unavoidable climate change?

i.  To what extent does the achievement of environmental sustainability depend on permitted uses being time limited?

2. Boundaries

The Commission wishes to investigate whether administrative boundaries and the way environmental planning is sub-divided between policy areas are hindering the pursuit of environmental sustainability.

a.  To what extent does a mismatch between administrative areas and environmental processes contribute to environmentally unsustainable planning, for instance in river catchments or along coastlines? What should be done about it?

b.  What problems arise from different plans being produced and implemented for overlapping geographical areas?

c.  Should the land use planning system be responsible for helping to deliver policy targets in other areas such as transport, energy, water provision, flood protection, climate change and nature conservation?

d.  How might geographical information systems (GIS) contribute to environmental planning in both the short and long term? What problems are associated with data accessibility and quality, and how might they be addressed?

e.  Does the lack of control over certain activities, such as forestry and agriculture, prejudice the achievement of environmental goals? If so, what would be the effect of introducing such controls?

3. Integration or coordination?

Different environmental planning regimes have grown up over time to serve different objectives. The Commission is interested in how well the current arrangements work as a whole.

a.  Does the current system need "fixing"? What gaps, unnecessary duplication and conflicts exist in present arrangements for environmental planning?

b.  Is there in practice a hierarchy in the formulation of different types of environmental plans? Would there be advantages in establishing a clearer hierarchy?

c.  Should the process of environmental planning be further integrated or rationalised, e.g. as in New Zealand? Or would better coordination be sufficient to ensure an efficient and effective system?

d.  Are present arrangements for environmental planning efficient and cost-effective? Can the wish to speed up the land use planning process be reconciled with effective environmental protection?

e.  Are the mandates and procedures of the pollution control bodies appropriate to their environmental planning responsibilities? Are these responsibilities appropriate? Is it practical to have parallel decisions on land use planning and pollution control?

f.  Has a satisfactory integration of transport planning and land use planning been achieved? If not, what more needs to be done?

g.  To what extent could economic instruments, non-statutory procedures, or informal arrangements complement environmental planning regulation, and how effective would they be at providing environmentally sustainable solutions? Would there be implications for openness, transparency and accountability?

h.  One possible economic instrument could be a "betterment tax" aiming to increase public ownership of development gain. Is such a tax feasible and desirable? Might there be some way of linking the rate of tax to environmental impact?

i.  Does the adoption of sustainability as the focus of policy intensify disagreements about the boundary between public and private development rights and obligations? To what extent does the current system enable such issues to be resolved?

4. Subsidiarity and democracy

The Commission is interested in the accountability and transparency of environmental planning regimes. There is often an inherent tension between delivering national policy targets and ensuring adequate local accountability in the vicinity of a development. Indeed policy targets themselves may be controversial. National targets may impose local environmental degradation against the wishes of the local population. On the other hand, the sum of local planning decisions across the country may not deliver national environmental protection targets. The Commission is also keen to ensure that decisions are taken at the most appropriate level with an appropriate range of inputs to the decision making process.

a.  Is the current balance between elected leadership, expert assessment and public participation in environmental planning decisions appropriate?

b.  How do we ensure that all levels of decision-making processes are sufficiently open, transparent and accountable to gain public acceptance? What are the best ways to reflect the range of public opinion whilst maintaining an appropriate procedural timetable? When should local public opinion be overridden in the interest of a broader common goal?

c.  What should be the relationship between international, national, regional and local goals? Should environmental planning take place at the lowest level consistent with the common good (the principle of subsidiarity)? How far do current arrangements depart from that principle?

d.  Are new regional planning arrangements, or other measures such as strengthening the strategic planning role of local government, needed to ensure greater coherence between national and local planning regimes? If so, what should these be and how should they be made accountable?

e.  To what extent do the principles of the environmental planning regimes in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland need to differ from each other? What are the specific drivers for these differences?

f.  Does the present form of planning inquiry offer the best way of resolving disputes? Should it be extended to permit a third party right of appeal? If so, should such rights be restricted to prevent abuse?

g.  Would environmental tribunals or courts enhance public confidence in the land use planning appeals process? If so, would they impose significant extra costs and delays?

5. Assessment approaches

There are many different approaches to assessing the impact of plans and developments. The Commission wishes to determine the most appropriate approaches to safeguard environmental sustainability while maintaining efficient planning systems.

a.  What are the most appropriate appraisal methodologies for use in drawing up environmental plans and assessing the environmental impact of plans prepared for other purposes? Do appraisal methodologies applied to individual cases provide sufficient information about their implications for the achievement of wider environmental goals?

b.  Could increased use of such methodologies dovetail effectively with the efficient operation of environmental planning systems? How widely applicable should environmental appraisal be? What level of detail is appropriate for the various plan types? Who should be responsible for: i) undertaking environmental appraisal, and ii) judging its quality?

c.  What would be the value of increased use of other assessment tools, e.g. sustainability appraisal, environmental capital, environmental footprint, environmental space, and health impact assessment?

d.  Are there good examples of comparisons between the actual environmental, social and economic effects predicted when a case was being considered and what the actual effects were? In addition, is there evidence of the effectiveness of pre-development mitigation and compensation agreements at avoiding unsustainable outcomes?

e.  How adequate is the knowledge base, including the location and availability of expertise, provision of training for practitioners, and the accessibility and quality of data? How far are any of these elements in the knowledge base constrained by the lack of resources or suitable institutions, and, if appropriate, how could that be remedied?

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